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Divided over gay activist |
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News -
Australian News
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Wednesday, 15 December 2010 07:07 |
Gay's divided over activist Gary Burns. An unholy row has erupted in Gay Sydney over the the work of gay activist and serial litigant Gary Burns.
"The Scavenger" reported that Burns - who has a long history of litigation over 'homophobic' incidents and in 2008 won $10,000 from radio station 2UE after gay men were ridiculed on air - is being stonewalled by Sydney's mainstream gay and lesbian organisations and the gay media. The article reported that Burns is being shunned by his own community, with members of gay "health and wellbeing organisation" ACON (formerly the AIDS Council of NSW), the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, and the NSW Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby, among others, criticising Burns publicly by way of a Gary Burns hate group on Facebook, which has since been removed.
Why? "Because I'm an outsider," surmised Burns.
"Its that simple. These people have corporatised themselves to the point where they think they’re above the community. They are nothing more than a self-appointed Gay Government.
"So when they see someone like me doing my work they think: 'How dare he? He’s not one of us. He doesn’t have the authority to speak. We didn’t give him permission!'"
In a colourful self-appraisal, Burns also called himself a media whore.
"Yes I'm a gay activist, yes I'm serial litigant, yes I'm a media whore – I'm all those things," he said.
"I have to be. If I wasn't a media whore I wouldn’t get my work done. By being a media whore I've built up a public profile – and that means people listen when I bring instances of homophobia to light. I can bring attention to things."
Burns also revealed that he has lodged an appeal an appeal against the recent NSW Anti-Discrimination Tribunal (ADT) decision that dismissed his case against Channel Nine’s The Footy Show, for a skit ('My Three Sons', May 9, 2009) which saw a fictitious gay brother of football stars Andrew and Matthew Johns ridiculed and taken to hospital for being "faulty".
Burns is also proceeding with a case against One Nationm candidate John Cunningham, who described gays and lesbians as "unfortunates" and said they should undergo "psychiatric counselling" during his failed bid to win a seat at the 2010 Australian Federal Election.
Full Scavenger interview with Burns located here:
http://www.thescavenger.net/glb/why-does-gay-inc-hate-gary-burns-34117.html
www.thescavenger.net |
